Ni Hao

Last night we had another great chinese meal and we decided to try Beijing duck, to show you what you are eating is fresh they include the head on the plate so our duck was all sliced up and on the edge of the plate was the head!!!!

Today was another 7am start and we had noodles for breakfast again as they are so filling.The wind was stronger today and it made the day even colder, Mel had to wear her Long Johns!!!!

David our guide (chinese people adopt english names) collected us and we joined our small group of 10 people for the day. It was a 1 hour drive to our jetty at Yang Ti and on the way we passed an overturned lorry which had been going too fast on the winding road and spilled it's load everywhere. Once at Yang Ti jetty we were issued panda stickers and David yelled out "Follow the panda flag" and we made our way to the jetty surrounded by hawkers selling absoloutely everything from hats to memory cards for cameras. Mel is really good at avoiding them and uses the look straight forward tactic where as I always seem to catch their eye and before I know it I have about 4 or 5 around me all shoving things into my hands!!

While our guide went off to check reservations I become custodian of the Panda Flag and it was like having a hawker forcefield around me as not one of them bothered me!!!!

Before the boat even pulled away the scenery was breathtaking even on such a cold day the limestone peaks jutting up from all sides and on all angles, of course there were the entreprising folk who followed the boat and attached their boats like limpet mines to our boat trying to sell their wares to us. It was pretty brisk up top on the boat but we were enjoying the scenery so much we braved it and only ended up with cold noses!!!

The trip down river seemed to go so quickly and we had to turn around and return to the jetty, normally the boat would do the 6 hour trip to Yangshuo but as it is dry season the river is too shallow, as litle as 2ft in places. On the way back we were served a fantastic lunch which we shared with a japanese family, the older guy started drawing pictures of Mel while we sat chatting, he did 2 drawings and let her keep one, he also sketched me but only did 1 drawing, I don't think I was good enough to remain in his book!!!

It was good fun watching how fast the japanese were with their chopsticks you could hardly see them moving sometimes and at one point it took me quite a while to lift a fish ball and eventually the japanese lady gestured to me just to roll it onto my plate, it was there that I got a good hold of it eventually.

Then it was back to the jetty to get hawked to death and I eventually broke and bought 2 lovely books full of scenic pictures of the area, after a light hearted barter session I got the price down from 50 yuan/3.30p to 30 yuan/2 quid.The drive to Yangshuo took 1 hour and we spent the rest of the afternoon browsing the shops and buying more stuff (sorry Hazel, another package to follow soon!!)

Like everywhere else in Asia you can just about barter for anything and this was the case when I needed some new boxer shorts but the sizes here are tiny and the lady fished out 2 pairs of XXL which probably equate to our medium, I hope!!!!

It was still so cold outside and we tried to use the local hotels for a pee but they were all very stern and sent us packing. When the bus arrived to take us back to Guilin it was toasty and warm which made us both fall asleep for the journey back to Guilin for around 6pm.

Today we leave for Chengdu further North on the train which will take us 25 hours but is cheaper than flying although that only takes 1 hour the train is more relaxing and you can meet some interesting people, so see you in Chengdu on the 15th.

Lots of love

M & M

xx